


A Journey Through Shadesmar

by CyclonicJet



Category: Cosmere - Brandon Sanderson, Stormlight Archive - Brandon Sanderson
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-21
Updated: 2020-12-19
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:28:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28171668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CyclonicJet/pseuds/CyclonicJet
Summary: Jasnah has survived the brutal assassination attempt on her life. But that was only the beginning, for now she is stuck in Shademar. Lost, with no way home.
Kudos: 6





	1. Chapter 1

Ten feet. That was how far it was to the ground. It was a long fall to make, especially when one was angled face down toward it, but Jasnah didn’t really have much time to consider it. She had rather more pressing matters to attend to. Like the knife sticking out of her heart.

She began falling. The flat glass like expanse of Shadesmar rising to meet her. She couldn’t afford to meet it head on, that would likely puncture the knife clean through her sternum, which would mean expending even more of what precious little Stormlight she had been able to grab before transitioning planes.

To prevent this she decided that there was only one reasonable course of action. She spun around and allowed her back to take the impact. On reflection though, it was pretty obviously apparent to her that the normally preternatural decision making abilities upon which she so regularly relied had been somewhat impaired in this moment, because in retrospect flipping herself over had clearly turned out to be an  _ awful _ idea.

She slammed into the ground, breaking a good number of bones across her body and giving herself whiplash violent enough to sever the portion of spine connecting her head with the rest of body.

She gasped reflexively, which was a good thing, for it forced Stormlight into her veins. Normally she’d have stopped to consider that phenomenon. How when one was in danger, they were usually inclined towards sharp intakes of breath, which facilitated the intake of Stormlight, allowing the healing process to commence. It seemed very convenient how that particular interplay had been established. But Jasnah didn’t think about that. All she could focus on was the deeply uncomfortable squirming sensation rippling across her body as bones were refused and muscles reknit.

But even as she felt herself recover, she noticed that a single portion of her body continued to draw in yet more valuable light. A part of her that refused to mend. Jasnah looked down to see her left breast blazing brightly against the dim Shadesmar sun. The knife was still lodged in there, its hilt sticking out of her chest like a driven spike.

Groaning, she reached over and extracted it in one sharp motion, an exercise that forced her to gasp reflexively a  _ second  _ time, causing her to drink in yet more Stormlight.

“Stupid!” she exclaimed harshly to herself. How much light had she just wasted on that little stunt?

“An insult this is.” said a nearby male voice. “An offense to suggest that I would bond someone ‘stupid’? Why, it’s downright insulting it is.”

Jasnah ignored him, using the now ebbing dregs of Stormlight to motivate herself to get back on her feet. She paused for a moment as she stood up, checking her footing was stable. Then she allowed herself to take a breath. She was alive. She had won. And her assassins had failed.

Taking that small bit of positive news, she braced herself to face the consequences of that survival. She opened her left hand to find a dozen or so dun spheres clenched inside. Only two amongst them still glowed, and they did so only weakly. They wouldn’t even last the day.

“Unfortunate.” Ivory noted, inspecting her hand. “Our easy passage is now not. Appears we shall not be bartering passage back to the place that is.”

Jasnah nodded, pocketing the gems. They’d have to find another route home. There was no use concerning herself over what they  _ could _ have done. It was now a closed avenue. She had needed that light to survive the immediate situation. No point fretting over it. What she needed to focus on now was what she could  _ do now  _ that she had arrived in this position, and not on what things she could have-

“Shallan!” she cried, the thought of her young ward suddenly hitting her like a sledgehammer. Jasnah had abandoned her back on the ship. In her rush to escape her assassins, she has completely neglected to think of the child.

“Yet even more unfortunate this is.” Ivory commented. “Much promise in her I saw. Pity such potential is now not.”

“No.” Jasnsh said defiantly. She turned to find the ship. The vessel itself hadn’t manifested on this side, but the lights of the souls of the people aboard had. And they were moving away. Fast. As the ship continued sailing away, it withdrew further and further from her. 

Jasnah forced herself into a sprint, charging headlong after it. But it quickly became apparent that no matter how fast she pumped her legs, she would never catch up. Even if she had possessed any stormlight, it was doubtful if even that would have been enough.

She continued running though. Watching the lights recede away from her. Eventually the matter was decided for her, as her own feet betrayed her, tripping her up, and sending her crashing down into the obsidian ground.

A groan escaped her lips, and she found herself unconsciously reaching for stormlight. A faint wisp funneled out of her pocket and into her breast. It was barely enough to drive her back onto her feet, before running out completely. She was not totally out of stormlight.

But she didn’t care about that. There was only one thing she could focus on. Those now distant lights, vanishing off towards the horizon.  _ Shallan... _

She was still standing there, watching after them even though they had long departed, when Ivory at last stepped up beside her. “Unfortunate it is.” he said, placing a hand on her shoulder.

Jasnah drew in a long breath, forcing herself to remain calm on the matter. “No.” she said. Not unfortunate. Shallan may be a little naive, but she’s resourceful. She’ll find a way to escape. I know she will.” At least that was the lie she had to tell herself, if only to soothe her own conscience about abandoning her.

Ivory hummed a tone that suggested disagreement. She ignored him.

“In any case, Shallan will need to fend for herself.” Jasnah said. “There was little we could have done from this side anyway.”

Ivory turned from her to look over the empty wastes of Shadesmar. “Little I am thinking that can be done for  _ ourselves _ in this place either...”

Jasnah followed his gaze, and found herself staring at the unbroken flat plane of black glass encompassing them.

They were alone, lost in a veritable wasteland. They had no supplies. No map. And not a friendly contact on the entire plane of existence. Well. At least that last one Jasnah was used too.

She sighed. “Well, standing around here isn’t going to improve our situation.” she said. She looked around and found herself staring north. “We weren’t too far from shore back on the material plane. I think our best course of action is to follow the coast. Hopefully we should be able to locate some kind of civilization before...before....”

“Before your strength is not.” Ivory finished for her.

She cast a glance at him. “Yes. Preferably before I die from starvation.”

“Or dehydration.” he noted. “Humans are partial to this form of expiry as well I think.”

Ignoring him for yet a third time, Jasnah started walking north towards the ocean.


	2. Chapter 2

The coast turned out to be far closer then she had anticipated. A lifetime traversing the material realm had left her ill adjusted to the kind of compression that occured on the cognitive plane.

She stopped at the shoreline, watching the uncountable number of beads move like waves across the ocean. They even lapped at the land like the seas back home, pushing up in rhythmic pulses before retreating back into the dark abyss.

Jasnah found herself somewhat enamoured by it. She really couldn’t afford to just stand about and take in the sights. There was too much work to be done. She needed to get home. But something about the sight gave her pause, keeping her rooted to the spot, leaving her watching the ocean of beads roll across the horizon.

Ivory stepped up beside her, staring out at the ocean as well, though his eyes seemed more focused upon the far distant sun instead.

Following a quiet moment of contemplation he turned to look at her. “I do not understand the utility of this action.” he said. “Is there a productive element that is I am missing?”

Jasnah shook her head. “None that I know of.”

“Then why are we doing it? Established our objective is. Time critical it is.”

“Indeed it is.”

“I continue then to not understand.”

Jasnah was silent for a moment. Then she closed her eyes and dipped her head the barest fraction. “I should have seen those assassins earlier.” she said quietly. “I should have recognised them for what they were sooner. I should have taken better precautions.”  _ I shouldn’t have abandoned Shallan…  _

“But I was too caught up in my studies. Too focused on the greater problems facing us to notice the immediate danger right in front of me.”

She opened her eyes, her fist clenched tightly at her side. “It’s my fault...those innocent men and women...their deaths...are my burden…”

Her  _ death is my burden… _

Ivory turned back to stare at the ocean. A moment passed. He nodded solemnly. “I think...I think I am understanding now.” Then they were silent. 

Together they stood there. Radiant and Spren. Watching the endless waves of beads shift and clack together in harmony before them. Contemplating their failure.

“...life before death.” Ivory finally said quietly, his eyes fixed upon the distant horizon.

Jasnah closed her eyes at those words, a long breath escaping her. At her side she could feel her hand clenching tightly into a fist.

“Strength before weakness…” she whispered.

She looked up at the ocean again. She could still feel the weight. The burden of those she had failed to save. But she knew that she couldn’t let it stop her. She had to keep moving forward. Too much depended on her. Too many other innocent lives were counting upon her. This? This could not be the end. Because the journey...the journey continued.

“Journey before destination.” they said in unison.


	3. Chapter 3

They walked in tandem. One step after another. The ocean to their right. The flat expanse of unbroken glass plains to their left. A few crystalline like plants sprouted around them, but otherwise the landscape was totally barren.

This kind of desolation did not deter Jasnah. She knew her destiny. And it did not involve dying here, in the middle of nowhere within the cognitive realm. She would survive this. Turn it to her advantage. She knew this as surely as she did that the sun would rise anew each day. It was simply an immutable fact.

Hour after hour they walked. At least that's what it felt like. It was difficult to tell time in Shadesmar. But still she pressed on. Refusing to break. Refusing to stop. To stop was to accept defeat. To accept death. She abjectly refused to allow that.

But, even so, as the hours stretched longer and longer, she could feel herself beginning to flag. Her legs tiring from the ceaseless march.

However her mind and soul remained driven. A drive she now forced her body to match. The landscape changed little as they travelled. The same plants. Same ocean. Same flat plains. Jasnah tuned it all out. Focusing only on putting one foot in front of the other. That was all that mattered.

It was only at the point that she could feel the breaking point was coming. The point where her body would at last betray and fail her, that something finally changed. A light appeared in this distance. Small and wane, it sat nestled up against the coast. It was a fire. A campfire. 

Slowing their pace, and without a single word needed to be said between them, Jasnah and Ivory moved cautiously towards it.

As they got close enough, they could distinguish a few figures huddled around it. Three of them appeared to be made of cracked stone, light gleaming out of their ruptured skin. The fourth spren, for they were all clearly spren, looked as if they were formed of a thousand interwoven strands of green vine. 

Jasnah nodded. Three peakspren and a cultivationspren. If her research was accurate then they would probably not prove to be all that dangerous towards her and Ivory. But that was of course, just a theory. And theory rarely ever survived contact with reality. So she continued to remain cautious in her advance.

It was one of the peakspren who first noticed them. He blinked at her. “A human?” they said. “Out here?” He shook his head. “Now I know I must be going mad.”

“No.” said one of the other peakspren. “I can see them too. Although I’m personally having a far harder time believing that I’m actually seeing that Inkspren right now.”

“No. Pretty sure he’s real too.” the first peakspren said.

Jasnah and Ivory stepped into the light, careful to remain out of range of any sudden attack. 

“A Rosharan?” the third peakspren said in a decidedly deeper voice than his companions. “It’s been a long time since I’ve seen one of those around here.”

He had a pipe in his mouth, and it shifted from one side to the other as he turned to study Ivory. “And even longer since I last saw an Inkspren journey this far south...”

He dropped his pipe into his hand and began knocking against his other hand. “I’m willing to bet there’s a mighty good story accompanying such a pair.” He put the pipe back in his mouth and gestured for the two of them to join them around the fire.

Jasnah hesitated. She could feel Ivory’s hesitation as well. 

“You’re awfully quick to trust.” she noted.

“Is there a reason I should not trust you?” he asked back. 

“Skulking about in the dark we are.” Ivory commented.

The peakspren gave Ivory a stare. “If you wanted to do us harm I don’t imagine you would have walked into our camp quite so casually. Most thieves I’ve met prefer to stay _out_ of sight.”

He tossed a look over at Jasnah, absorbing her appearance.

“Besides. You don’t look like thieves to me. You look more like refugees. Or folks who have just had a right hard time of it.”

Jasnah followed the peaksprens gaze, staring down at herself. He was right. Her dress was in tatters, torn apart during her escape from the assassins, and the hem worn thin at the base from the full day's march. But that wasn’t the worst of it.

Her chest was coated in dried blood from where the knife had ripped open the bust. And even worse, she realised with no great amount of shock, that her safe hand was exposed. Her assassins having rudely denied her even the simple common courtesy of allowing her to even put on a glove before murdering her.

All in all it was perhaps the most undignified look she had ever borne. ‘ _Turn that to our advantage._ ’ she thought.

Quickly and discreetly, she tucked her safe hand away into her sleeve and out of sight. Then she looked back to meet the peakspren eyes.”I-“ she started to say.

“You are Radiant.” a soft feminine voice cut over her.

All of them turned to face the speaker. The cultivationspren, who continued to calmly stare into the flames. Ignoring the eyes fixated upon her.

“An Inkspren.” she said. “The spren of an Elsecaller.” She looked at Jasnah. “You have formed the Nahel bond. You are Radiant.”

_Remain in control. Make the situation your own._

She spent a moment staring her down. “Yes.” she finally answered. “I am.”

Out of the corner of her eye she could see Ivory shift uncomfortably at Jasnah’s ready admission. Most spren detested the Knights Radiant. They who had broken their oaths. They who had condemned their spren to death. In Roshar, the Recrance was history, near mythology. In Shadsmar, it was still well within living memory.

“I see.” the cultivationspren said, turning back to stare at the flames. Jasnah kept her focus on her, but could hear the peakspren muttering amongst themselves. She didn’t know what to expect next. A rebuff? A polite request that they leave? Maybe even an attack? She was too inexperienced with intricate political structures of the spren to judge how these four would react to the news.

What she could not have anticipated was what the cultivationspren said next.

“The Knights Radiant...killed my sister.” she whispered, turning to look back at Jasnah. “Please sit with us, so that I may share with you her story.”


	4. Chapter 4

Exhaustion struck Jasnah like a Highstorm. No sooner had she sat down then did the full weight of her self-imposed forced march come crashing down upon her. A day. A whole  _ storming _ day she had forced herself to keep walking. And now it was time to pay the price for such diligence, and without a single drop of Stormlight to offer her any relief from it.

She and Ivory settled down opposite the peakspren, ensuring they remained a relatively cautious distance away, and keeping the fire between them, just in case. The cultivation spren however sat adjacent to them, perched alone atop a wooden stool, her eyes still staring into the fire. Jasnah was confident she had nothing to fear from the spren. Except maybe her words.

“So.” said the deep voiced peakspren. “Radiant huh?

“As we concurred upon mere moments ago.” Ivory said.

The peakspren grunted an acknowledgement. “And does a Radiant have a name?”

Jasnah considered briefly the wisdom of revealing her identity. But if they hadn’t already cast her away for being a radiant, it was unlikely her family name would achieve the effect either. “Jasnah. Jasnah Kholin.” she stated. “And this is my bond spren, Ivory.”

The chief peakspren nodded at her slowly. “Kan’ador.” he said. He indicated his two companion peakspren. “Uta’lem. Daza.”

Jasnah nodded at each in turn as he provided their names. Then her eyes were drawn back to the cultivationspren. She remained silent. Her trance-like gaze remained fixed on the flames.

“Wynsle.” Kan’ador said, nodding his head towards her. She nodded, still looking into the fire.

“Fenelin.” Wynsle said in a hushed voice. “That was her name...my sister…”

Jasnah for once found herself unsure what to say. Should she offer an apology for the actions of her forebears? No. That was foolishness. Jasnah could not know the reason why the Radiants of old had abandoned their oaths. To apologise for such would be presumptuous. Besides, it wasn’t as though Jasnah herself had killed this sprens sibling. What would her apology achieve but the utterance of a few token and hollow words. Perhaps instead she could offer some simple condolences. That should suffice.

“I’m sorry for your loss.” she replied with what sympathy she could infuse her voice with. It’s not that she didn’t feel it, she was just so storming tired.

Wynsle didn’t reply. Nor did she look at her. She looked to be lost in a world of her own.

“Don’t mind her.” Kan’ador said softly. “She wants to tell you the story, but she’s never been completely comfortable talking about what happened. Lot of pain there you know.”

Jasnah did understand. That feeling of loss. The pain that followed in its wake.  _ Shallan… _

“It is a thing I would question.” Ivory suddenly interjected. “As did how three peakspren and a cultivationspren end up being traveling the Idle Wastes?”

Kan’ador turned, his expression hardening as he eyed Ivory. “We could ask the same of you.” he replied gruffly. “However. Our story isn’t really all that spectacular, so I don’t mind sharing.”

He gestured towards Wynsle. “We are escorting an old friend. Seeing her home safe.”

“Cultivationspren have not a home. It is known.” Ivory stated sharply. Jasnah eyes him. That had been a little snappish for him? She’d rarely, if ever, heard him be rude.

“Not as a people, no.” Kan’ador replied. “But that don’t mean they live nowhere at all.”

“And where is this  _ home  _ exactly?” Jasnah said.

He opened his mouth to reply, but a different voice answered.

“Vislah.” Wynsle said. “This is where we are heading.”

Jasnah had not heard of this settlement. Likely not the kind of place even worth stamping on a map.

“I’m unfamiliar with-“

“Vislah.” Ivory said over her, his tone of voice shaken somewhat. “Your home is Vislah.”

Jasnah shifted her head to look at him, and hound herself positively stunned.  _ Storms _ . He was shaking. True, he was only vibrating relatively mildly, but for Ivory that might as well have been a full throated, mouth frothing rage. Jasnah had never seen him react to anything like this before.

Wynsle nodded in affirmation. Then, in an even more shocking display of utterly uncharacteristic emotion, Ivory actually  _ jumped _ to his feet, giving Wynsle a hard black stare.

“That place no longer is!.” he said, punctuating each word.

“It was not.” Wynsle replied quietly. “So we rebuilt it.”

Ivory snapped. He jabbed a long black finger accusingly at her. “Then you are fools! This is!” he exclaimed. “Those ruins are cursed! This is also! Curse you I would! If not damnation be already upon you!”

With that, Ivory spun around and stalked away.

Jasnah found herself unable to speak. Her wits had utterly fled her. She belatedly realised she was in honest to honour shock. What in the name of Kelek’s own breath had just happened?

She stared after the spren, as he marched a good distance from the camp and turned to stare out at the ocean instead, pointedly refusing to look back at them.

“Charming friend you have there.” Kan’ador muttered. “Never knew an Inkspren could get so animated.”

Jasnah just worked her jaw, unable to form words, as she continued to stare after him. 

“I am sorry.” Wynsle said softly. “I did not mean to upset him.”

“You ain’t got nothing to apologise for.” Kan’ador said adamantly. “If anything he should be the one apologizing.”

Jasnah finally found her tongue agin. “Apologize? For what exactly?” she asked, snapping her head back to them. “What’s going on?”

“You mean the inkspren hasn’t told you?” he said. “That’s perhaps not all that surprising. They like keeping their secrets. Too much like damned cryptics in that regard.”

_ Regain control of the situation. _

“What has he failed to inform me of?” she asked tersely. She detested secrets. Especially those being kept from her by those she supposedly trusted.

Kal’anor looked out towards Ivory for a moment, then sighed in a manner only those who had seen too much life could produce. “It’s not a happy tale Radiant.”

“In my experience I have found few that are.”

He gave a half grunt in acknowledgement, then went silent, letting the crackle of the fire fill the void left in the wake of his voice. He shifted slightly, turning his own gaze upon the flames this time. “It started, just after the Recrence…”


	5. Chapter 5

Ivory stood upon the precipice, looking up at the crimson sky. That was rare. A sight not seen in generations. It was a sky that belonged to anger. To fury. To the darkest aspects of a spren’s being. And today it belonged to him.

Below he could see the city. Vislah. A relatively large city by spren standards, it sat pressed up along the coast, sheltered by tall cliff like protrusions sprouting up all around its circumference. Today, those cliffs were its own undoing. The people inside had nowhere to go. What ships could flee had long since already done so. Now all that remained inside its walls were dead eyes, monsters, and the traitors who harboured them. Soon those monsters would all be dead. And justice would be served.

"This day...long in coming it is.” Ivory’s captain said, standing at the head of the overhang, his eyes fixed upon the city. “Now, the city's time at its end be.”

From one of the adjacent hills, a loud horn blared. The signal to advance. The captain set the pace. A steady march down the slope. They were joined by others, soon forming an unstoppable tidal wave, one that would wash Vislah clean off the face of Shadesmar.

They approached the walls unmolested. No defenders charged out to meet them. No desperate last stand was being made. Ivory furrowed his brow at that. Had they somehow managed to slip out of the city? To escape their encirclement? No. That was absurd. They had to be here, and yet as they marched through the open gates still no one greeted them.

Ivory started feeling unnerved, as empty street after street passed them by. Every so often he would spot a cultivationspren staring from behind a curtained window, or vanishing back behind a hurriedly shut doorway. But they did not stop for them. They were not the reason they were here. But those that they _were_ here for refused to appear, and Ivory felt himself becoming frustrated. This was not how this was supposed to go. They were supposed to fight back. To struggle. To follow their _damned oaths_! 

It was only as they approached the citadel that someone finally emerged to face them. A long figure stood upon the long steps leading up inside. It was a human. He wore no armor. Bore no weapons. Clothed in only the simplest of garments. Except for one aspect. Upon his back he bore a long strident cloak, emblazoned with the symbol of traitors. Of _oathbreakers_. Of the Knights Radiant.

From the mass of Inkspren, a single figure detached themselves, stepping forward. It was Jewel. The leader and head of their forces. She approached the base of the steps and stared up at the lone man. He stared back. Not with a hard look. But with one of sorrow, and tragic fatality.

“Oathbreaker!” Jewel cried for all to hear. “Even in defeat you betray your vows! So readily accepting your own death! With nary a sword raised in your own defense!”

The man continued to stare impassively at her. He didn’t react in the slightest.

“Nor a word uttered to delay the inevitable!” she cried. “Where is your fabled strength now!? Why has your once hallowed struggle to preserve life so suddenly fled you!?”

The knight shifted, but continued to say nothing.

Jewel turned back to face the Inkspren massed behind her. “Do you see! This is all that is left of them! A broken lifeless shell! They are so far fallen from what they once were that they can not even rouse themselves to contradict my words!”

Ivory turned and looked at the man. Truly looked at him. And he found her words to be right. But perhaps not in the sense she implied. The man standing before them was broken. He could see it in his eyes. But it was not a hollowness, as Jewel suggested. It was a look of _pity_ . Of remorse. _Storms._ Now that he looked properly he could see the man was barely holding it together. Afraid to even speak lest he should fall apart.

In that moment Ivory felt like he finally understood. He could see it plain as day in the man's face. The final hidden truth. The one everyone else had missed, and the perhaps the greatest tragedy of the Recrence itself. The Knights Radiant had betrayed their oaths...unwillingly...

But no one else saw it. They all saw what he had himself not moments ago. An arrogant monster who had led so many of Ivory’s kin to their deaths. An oathbreaker. Deserving of neither mercy nor pity.

Jewel finished her sermon, offering her final venomous condemnation of the Knights Radiant, before spinning back to look up at the man. “Now! Radiant! In the name of what little honor you might still possess, we demand you release to us those you hold hostage! Give us our kin and we may yet let you live!”

That seemed to finally rouse the Radiant from his stupor. He seemed to spend a moment gathering himself, and then spoke. “There are no words that I might say that could sway you.” he said in a defeated tone. “And I know you will twist what words I do provide into poison. But I can not allow you to take them. They are our wards. Our charges. It is our duty to care for them.”

“Care for them!?” Jewel shouted. “Is that what you call murdering them! Is that what you call breaking your oaths and shattering their minds!?”

“This path was not chosen lightly.” the Radiant replied. “We did not intend this. But still, the consequences are ours to bear. And so, I can not release them to you.”

Jewel stared up at him. An oppressive quiet sitting like a blanket upon all of them. “So be it.” she whispered. “At long last, I can now accept the truth that I have for so long refused to burden upon my heart. Honor is at last finally, and truly, dead.”

The Radiant bowed his head and said no more.

Jewel eyed him a moment, and then slowly lifted her blade over her head. “Free the deadeyes.” she proclaimed. “Scatter the cultivationspren and tear every block of this accursed city down into the dust. Cast the remains into the sea and let no trace of this place remain.” She pointed her sword at the Radiant. “Kill every Radiant you find. And then let us be done with this.”

Nothing happened for a moment. Then the mass of Inskpren surged forward, charging towards the staircase. Those at the back turned and marched against the city itself. Kicking down doors and pulling terrified spren from their homes. 

The Radiant upon the steps never even lifted a finger in his own defense as the swarm of Inkspren approached, and then cut him down. Ivory stood transfixed on the spot. Other spren swarming away from him. He couldn’t move. His body refusing the orders he gave it. He looked down at his hands and clenched them. What was wrong?

He had dreamed of this day. Imagined himself exacting the same revenge his compatriots were now executing all around him. Defending the honor of his fallen brethren. But now that he stood here? No longer just dreaming it, but actually living it? He felt no honor. He felt no desire for revenge. All today would achieve is more misery. More suffering. More death.

He looked up to see cultiavtionspren being herded into the streets, and then driven inexorably towards the edge of the city, forever cast out from their homes. He stared up to see the sky pulsing red above them all. Looking like the everstorm itself returned. He stared back down at the stairs to find a trampled broken body lying there. A ruined cape laying draped over its back. Ivory stared at the symbol emblazoned upon it, now coated in deep crimson blood.

 _Life before death. Strength before Weakness. Journey before Destination_. These were the words of the Knight Radiant. The oaths that turned men and women into Children of Honor. Oaths that were now every bit as dead as the men and women who had once sworn them. And Ivory found himself doing something remarkable. Something he had thought impossible. He wept. He wept for their loss.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I struggled to write Jewel in the form of Inkspren speech. So instead I'm just going to say she learnt how to speak with proper mannerisms before the Recrence and be done with it.
> 
> I have more chapters written, but they need a lot of work still. But I got tired of what I had so far sitting on my computer. So I thought I'd upload and share it. Who knows. Maybe I'll even actually finish this project. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯


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